DIFFERENT

Max Corbett
Mrs. Byrd
English 10
29 October 2014
Different
When I was younger, I always knew that there was something different about me. In fourth grade,I caught myself viewing my friends in a more than friendly way, I was repulsed. There was no way I was like that “faggot” we saw at school, or the man that helped people decorate their homes on HGTV. I was drowning in stereotypes.
The resounding question, “How can I be like this?” echoed in my mind. By seventh grade, I came to the conclusion that I could never be with a woman, let alone be in love with one. My peers wondered why I’d never had a girlfriend. My name was on everyone’s lips, and whispers weaved their way through crowded hallways. Students began to ask me if I was gay. I denied all accusations, brushed the questions away as though I could erase the thought from my mind. I was able to hide the truth more easily from those who didn’t share my blood. God only knows what my family was thinking.
My close family includes my three older brothers, John, Andrew and Tim, as well as my sister Brittney. My siblings are senior to me by several years. John, the eldest, is 32 and is  married to Amanda, with two-year old Emma. John is a great guy, just very high strung; a lot of negative energy surrounds him. Andrew is admirable, and at age 29 he is getting his life together and is engaged to his fiancé and has a son named Aiden, who’s six years old. Tim’s a loner, and his current job has him away from the family, with maybe twenty days out of the year at home. He’s working constantly, and commuting cross country weekly, so he’s not an integral part of the family unit. My sister Brittney, 22, is a lot like myself. Brittney and I share a bond that cannot be broken, we’re stuck like glue. Brittney is married to her husband Aaron, who is more than just my sister’s husband. He’s a true part of our family.
 During middle school and most of high school, so far, John worked for Fairfax County Public Schools, and Amanda worked at a women’s oncologist office. While the two were at work,  mother babysat Emma. Seeing John was often, and not too exciting. There’d always be something he was upset with. As far back as I could remember, John and I never got along. I believe that’s because of his post-high school hair loss. Him and I would always find something to bicker about, sometimes it was because I’d “Never work as hard as him.”,
as he always said. Other times it was because he hated Route One and everything about it. He’ll probably give himself a stroke before 40.
In middle school, I was really trying to grasp this whole “I’m gay” thing. Though I hadn’t told anyone, I made an effort to put off the “straight vibes”, whatever that is. So I began dating my first girlfriend, her name was Sarah. Sarah was a wonderful girl. Her personality was bubbly, and she was always laughing. Her hair ran down her back, like water flowing from a waterfall. Sarah was beyond beautiful. I kept her around for her company, not for any other reason besides a “cover-up”. One time she told me that she loved me. All I could muster up was
“I like you a lot, too.”
To say the least that didn’t help the situation. I felt bad because she had these feelings for me, and I felt nothing more than a friend would for her. Before I ended things with Sarah, we had been together for eight months. Sarah, who didn’t have a clue that I was different (and to think about it now, probably still has no idea.) was heartbroken, I couldn’t do this to another girl again. Though in middle school, I never wanted to label myself as gay, I stuck with the word “curious” and hoped that would magically make me attracted to women.
Freshmen year of high school was an interesting time. Many things at home were falling apart, and I felt like I was in abys, slowly drowning. Liking women was just out of the question now; I saw them as beautiful creatures, though I wasn’t sexually attracted to them. Since this attraction had been absent for my whole life, I came to the conclusion that I didn’t like women, that I was gay. Looking back now, I’m glad that I knew what was up, instead of being in a grey area, where I didn’t know what I wanted.
I made the decision to share this information with my family and friends. Early in the morning on November 11th, 2013,  I was sleeping over at my friend Lexi’s house when I decided to do something. I told Lexi my news and she suggested that we could tell my mother, together. There I was at 2a.m., texting my mom with tears running down my face,
“I have to tell you this… I’m gay, I’m so sorry.” I typed.
Though texting wasn’t the most personal or sincere way to tell her, it was done. I asked her to restrain from telling Dad, but that was shot down real fast when she picked me up that morning.
     “Hon I’ve know you were gay since you were three, oh and also Dad knows you’re gay.” shes said calmly, with a giddy-expression on her face. Though he wasn’t too keen about my news, he would learn to accept me for who I was not too long after he had found out.
With the reaction I received from my mother, I decided it was time to go all out. Social media made it easy for me to tell the rest of my network, I posted status updates on all of my websites. The rave of my news was uplifting. All of my friends supported me, along with people I didn’t even know. The rest of my family finally found out via my Mother, except for John. My family explicitly told me not to tell John. John and I have always had our issues, and his extreme jealousy of my hair, and my free spirit personality always got in the way. We weren’t ever lovey dovey or anything, but that’s just how brothers are I guess.
I told John towards the end of November over text. His first response was, “Are you fucking serious?”
 Knowing that it could only go downhill from there, I replied with a simple, “Yes.”
 It took a few minutes to get a response. While I was waiting, my hands were trembling, finally my phone bleeped. Everything was dead silent. Hesitantly, I opened the message. The text spanned the screen of my phone. This was going to be bad. Reading it broke my heart, my brother who I loved unconditionally said,
“I disown you, you’re not worth anything, I can’t believe my brother is a faggot”
 that’s all that I can remember.
After John’s reaction I wasn’t myself. Emptiness was in my heart and in my body. Everything on the inside of me was dark. Just weeks after my brother told me that I’d been a disappointment and shame to my family, my liveliness was gone. My mood plummeted; that’s when I was diagnosed with major depression. John’s reaction hit me harder than I thought it would. Seeing him wasn’t an option in my mind, because the times that I saw him, he’d say homophobic remarks, punch me and do anything in his power to make me feel less of a person. He degraded me, and I began therapy in December with Katie Taves, a physiatrist in Alexandria. Katie and I bonded; when I was there, I was safe. I was safe to be myself. I continued therapy with Katie until October 2014, until Katie started working with children under the age of seven.
The trauma that John ensued on me has continued to hurt me for the last year. I developed a negative body image, a negative self-confidence scale of myself, and a true development of clinical depression. John was also under the impression that I had chosen to be this way. Sometimes I wonder what goes through his head, who would chose to have this hate put down upon them. I told him,
“Being gay is like having a foot-fetish. You can deny that you have an unnatural likeliness of feet, but you’ll always like feet.”
I told him that no one says,
 “Today I am going to have a foot-fetish.”
It doesn’t work like that. Nobody chooses what they like, it just happens. Now, John and I are on O.K. terms. We tolerate each other around family, and around ourselves occasionally, speaking to one another. Though I don’t particularly like him, I’ll always love him.
Since this experience, I’ve learned to be tolerant of my sexuality. I may not love that specific part of myself, but it’s there and it’s staying. People at school are under the impression that I’m this overly confident, well-rounded person. I’m not; I’m scared of the world, I’ve seen the darkest side of it and now I’m getting close to the brightest. My motto for the past year is “Do you, and only you.”